Blogs from Ecuador, South America - page 640

I fished for piranah! I swam with electric eels! I swung from vines! I ate ants that tasted like lemons! I had a Huaroni elder show me how to use a 4 foot long blowgun! I paddled upriver in a dugout canoe with only a freshly plucked branch! It was one amazing Amazon adventure. Every day that I stepped into the jungle to go to work it was like stepping into a zoo. I saw so many frogs, including a Blue Jean Dart frog, and lizards and a few snakes. I saw four species of monkies including Saki monkies! Saki monkies!!! There were birds everywhere Toucans and Gruas and Parrots. The Long Tailed Potoo I saw was probably the most incredible bird I have ever seen. There were some spectacular animals along the river as well, ... read more

Regalos means gifts or presents in Spanish. Now Galapagos Islands is in its Christmas fever, and the locals are spending massively compared to normal. Everyone is expecting a gift or something, but there is one way of giving gifts to the community by hanging things on a post about 10 metres high! The post is normally made of bamboo, and they make sure to oil the post to make it difficult for any climber out there. Just a few hours ago, I was riding on my rickety bicycle around the Puerto Ayora Island, I spotted some kind of festivity going on. As I approached the crowd, I saw people cheering up to a person who was struggling to climb up a bamboo post to get some presents. I thought it was easy, until I touched the ... read more

Diving in the Galapagos Islands - if you're a diver you already know why that's such an exciting proposition. We were lucky to be able to do so, as all of the dive shops in Puerto Ayora (on Santa Cruz island) were pretty much booked solid. Finally though we managed to arrange two days of diving, albeit with two different companies. The first day of diving was at North Seymour island. There was some current (usual for the Galapagos) and the water was a relatively chilly 22 deg C so both Emma and I found it a challenge. We were lucky not to be seasick too as the boat was all over the place! Not so for our diving companions on this trip sadly ,-) The diving though was excellent. We swam with eagle rays and ... read more

I have been under a bit of pressure from friends and colleagues telling me to start a blog. I wonder what do guys want to here from an Iguana man like me! Recently Iguanas and Tortugas (meaning the giant tortoises) had a hard time in Isabela Island. It is almost a month now since we had volcanic eruptions of Sierra Negra. Flocks of journalists from various countries came to shoot the eruption. It was no surprise to see journalists in a situation like that, but seeing professional eruption hunters was one thing I never thought of. A whole new profession of eruption hunters has been there for years, but only last month after encountering one eruption hunter, I learnt about the profession. These are the guys who will spend every penny to arrive in time for ... read more

The next morning we had a moderate lie in, breakfast at 7am! We set off into the jungle again, hiking over an hour to a native community beside the Napo. On the way we saw the usual grasshoppers and butterflies, plus a few turtles. Medardo showed us a tree called the Sandy tree, from which the natives use the sap as a medicine for the kidneys and other ailments. He also showed us a tree covered in spikes, called the 'punishment tree' because the natives used to tie prisoners to it tight. They would die from blood loss, or more likely, from being eaten alive by ants and other insects. He cut out grubs from a rotting tree and ate them, and climbed high up into the canopy to get us all sorts of fruits. We ... read more